bubblegum
by Someone aka Me
Summary: Cho can't wait to turn 18 and search for her soulmate. It… doesn't go quite like she wants.


RA: Day 14: At the age of eighteen, everyone goes into another world for two months, hanging out with their soulmate. Time is warped to make sure the two of you are (chosen age above) in this world. When the time is up, you're sent back into the real world, with fractured memories of what happened. These foggy memories make it hard to find them again.

* * *

Cho can't wait for her eighteenth birthday.

She can't wait for her soulmate.

She's done with trying to date and making the wrong choices. For a while, she thought maybe it could be Cedric. He was perfect, kind and generous and smart, and Cho thought he might be her forever.

But then she lost him.

And that's not even counting that whole disaster with Harry.

But her soulmate will make it better.

Her soulmate will make her feel whole.

…

She slips into her dreams that night and slips away. She finds herself in a forest, light cascading down between the trees. A path spills out in front of her.

She follows it. Her feet are bare, but the dirt is warm and soft under her toes.

The trees give way to a clearing, and there, in the middle of the clearing, is a beautiful woman in a white dress. It's strapless, coming to a V in the middle and perfectly framing her breasts.

Cho never really figured her soulmate would be a woman, but… wow. She is not complaining.

The woman smiles, and her face lights up. "Hi," she says. "I'm Alice."

"Cho," she says.

And she was wrong. _This_ is what forever feels like.

…

They get two months. Two perfect months, without anything else to worry about. Two months to fall in love.

Alice loves pancakes. And bunny rabbits, especially when they poke their heads out from underground. Her favourite subject is Potions and she hates Charms. She hates cilantro with a passion. She adores bubble gum. Her favourite word is "mayday." She asks for a friendship first and Cho is all too happy to oblige.

Her eyes are bright grey and they sparkle when she laughs. She's taller than Cho, and Cho fits into the curve of her arms perfectly.

She has nimble fingers and she can play Cho like a piano, finding the best spots, inside and out.

Cho never wants to leave.

And then she closes her eyes and wakes up and it's her 18th birthday again.

…

Her memories, like anyone's time in the soul-world, are hazy. She remembers joy, and the play of the sun on leaves. She remembers the curve of a beautiful waist, a white dress. She remembers the scent of bubblegum.

It's not enough.

It's not _enough_.

The only way to know for sure is skin to skin contact, to feel a spark and the knowledge deep in the marrow of the bones.

But Cho doesn't even know where to start looking.

She wonders if maybe her soulmate is young enough that maybe there's not much to look for. They probably talked about when they were born, but _Cho can't remember_.

She spends three years travelling the world, shaking the hands of as many women as she can. But nothing helps.

So she takes a deep breath, and she goes home.

It's time to find herself.

It's time to stop trying to find herself in someone _else_.

It's time to find herself within.

…

She takes a training position at St. Mungos. She wants to know what it is to heal. She wants to help people.

This is who she wants to be.

And of course, it just figures that when she stops looking, that's when she finds Alice.

One month into her training they put her on long-term spell damage for a rotation.

She walks into the longest term part of the ward, and she knows.

She knows the woman on that bed.

She moves forward in a daze, reaches out. She touches the woman's hand, gently.

A spark leaps.

The woman doesn't even look at her. She just keeps staring at the ceiling.

Cho doesn't understand.

She doesn't understand.

As she looks at the woman on the bed, she remembers a laugh that felt like sunshine and eyes that sparkled.

Her eyes aren't sparkling anymore.

"Oh, Mrs. Longbottom isn't having a good day, dearie," says the Healer who's training her today. "Truth be told, she hasn't had a good day in a while."

Cho's voice is trembling in a way she doesn't mean for it to be when she says, "What does a good day look like?"

The nurse shrugs. "She's often up and about. When her son comes to visit… well. I wouldn't say she recognizes him exactly, but she's at least active."

Her soulmate has a son. Her soulmate has a son that she _doesn't recognize_.

This isn't what it's supposed to be like.

They're supposed to have more time. They're supposed to find each other and fall in love all over again. They're supposed to have their happily ever after, aren't they?

How are they supposed to have a happily ever after like this?

"Oh, don't cry, honey," her training Healer says, pulling out her wand for a diagnostic spell. Cho hadn't even noticed her eyes were moist. "You're going to have to accept the fact that sometimes we can't save everyone."

Cho doesn't know how to explain that that's not the issue here. Instead, she just turns away.

…

Some days, Alice gives her gum wrappers and Cho remembers the scent of bubblegum in a forest.

Some days, Alice doesn't seem to know that anything is happening beyond her own head.

Cho saves all the gum wrappers anyway.

It's not the love Cho expected. It's not what they had in two stolen months.

But it's still love, all the same.

* * *

Writing Month/Dragons: 906

Auction: word: moist, 90 coins

Romance Awareness: Day 14

Holmes: wand

Fortnightly: Women: (quote) "You don't find your worth in a man. You find your worth within yourself and then you find a man who is worthy of you. Remember that."

Shay's Musical Challenge: **The King and I** \- write about learning something in a place you didn't expect. alt, write a royalty!au

Trope of the Month: 2. Song: Beyonce - Crazy in Love / Book Club: **Ofglen:** (word) Mayday, (word) Friendship, (word) Underground / Amber's Attic: S2: 2. New School- Write about someone or something childish. / Lyric Alley: 25. I know that I deserve your love / Em's Emporium: 20. **Ned** (Isaacswolfsbane): (sexuality) Bisexual. Alt — (au) Actress/Actor. / Lo's Lowdown: Q5: "You're going to have to accept the fact that sometimes we can't save everyone." / Bex's Bazaar: O1: Elmer The Patchwork Elephant - Write about someone realising that it's okay to be different. Alternatively, write about someone being bullied for being different.

Choc Frogs: **(Silver): Alice Longbottom:** Challenge: Write about Alice Longbottom


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